Political commentator and YouTuber Benny Johnson, left, speaks with Eric Trump, son of Donald Trump, before the 2024 Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Johnson created the video for Tenet Media. The Justice Department has accused a company matching Tenet’s description of working with employees of Russian state broadcaster RT to covertly spread a pro-Russian narrative in the U.S. Johnson said he had no knowledge of Tenet’s ties to Russia.
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Federal officials have accused Russia of using the influence of right-wing Americans to spread the virus Kremlin propaganda before the 2024 presidential election.
On Wednesday, The Department of Justice hired two RT employeesRussian state media broadcaster, with plans to secretly fund and direct the production of social media videos that garner millions of views.
RT officer, his name in the indictment as Kostiantyn Kalashnikov and Elena Afanasyeva, have been charged with conspiracy to commit money laundering and conspiracy to violate the Foreign Agents Registration Act. He is accused of embezzling nearly $10 million to an unnamed Tennessee company that contracts with online influencers with large audiences.
“The company never told the influencers or their millions of followers of their ties to RT and the Russian government,” Attorney General Merrick Garland said Wednesday.
The indictment details Nashville-based Tenet Media, including a description of its website: “a network of heterodox commentators focused on Western political and cultural issues.”
Tenet was founded in 2022 by Lauren Chen, a conservative Canadian YouTuber, and her husband, Liam Donovan, whose X profile describes him as the president of Tenet Media. Chen hosts a show on Glenn Beck’s BlazeTV and is a contributor to the right-wing activist group Turning Point USA. He wrote opinion pieces for RT in 2021 and 2022.
According to the indictment, the founder of the Tennessee company cooperated with Kalashnikov and Afanasyeva – who both knew Russia – to recruit influencers to make videos published on YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, and X. The indictment stated that almost 2,000 YouTube videos collected more. of 16 million views, which tracks with general statistics on the Tenet Media YouTube channel.
Chen and Donovan did not respond to requests for comment.
The accusations against Kalashnikov and Afanasyeva came as US intelligence officials said foreign efforts aimed at swaying the outcome of the escalating election. On Wednesday, the government seized 32 internet domains connected to separate Russian influence operationwhen Iran recently accused of trying to hack Republican and Democratic presidential campaigns.
What sets RT’s operation apart from many other disturbing efforts is that it seems to reach a real audience, thanks to the recognizable name attached.
“Buying genuine influencers is a better use of funds than creating fake personas, because they bring a trusted audience and are, you know, real,” wrote Renée DiResta, author The Invisible Ruler: Those Who Turn Lies into Realityabout how online influencers spread propaganda and rumours, in a post in Thread.
Fictitious funders and lucrative contracts
After Russia invades Ukraine in February 2022, Many American cable distributors dropped RT’s US channel, RT Americafrom lineups, and finally shut down production. The video scheme allowed RT to secretly reach American audiences without ever being on the airwaves, according to the indictment.
Tenet was launched publicly in November 2023 with six well-known contributors in the right-wing media, including Benny Johnson, Tim Pool, David Rubin, and Lauren Southern. Videos made for Tenet regularly cover conservative staples including “gang migrants,” transgender people, online censorship, and attacks on Vice President Kamala Harris and President Joe Biden.
“Although the views expressed in the videos are not uniform, the subject matter and content of the videos are often consistent with the Russian Government’s interest in expanding US domestic divisions in order to reduce US opposition to the Russian Government’s core interests, such as the war in Ukraine,” the indictment said.
A 2012 file photo of Tim Pool, who later launched a career as a right-wing social media influencer. Pool is also paid by Tenet but says he controls the editorial content of the videos
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The indictment accuses Kalashnikov and Afanasyeva of working with the founders of the Tennessee company to hide the origin of the funding. He told several contributors that the company was backed by a wealthy European banker named Eduard Grigoriann. “In fact and reality, Grigoriann is a fictional persona,” the indictment said.
The influencers do not know the Russian connection of the project. On Wednesday, Johnson, pond and Ruby sent statements in X describing himself as a victim. South did not respond to a request for comment.
“If this allegation proves to be true, I, as well as other people and commentators, were deceived,” wrote Pool.
“I know nothing about this fraudulent activity. Period,” Rubin wrote.
Johnson said he had been pitched by a “media startup” and “negotiated a standard, arm’s length deal, which was then terminated.” The latest video on Tenet Media’s YouTube channel is from August 29th.
The Tennessee company offered favorable terms, according to the indictment. One influencer is paid $400,000 per month, a $100,000 signing bonus, and additional performance bonuses in exchange for four videos a week.
Afanasyeva allegedly exerted a lot of control over the Tennessee company’s operations and what it launched, including pushing certain angles that echoed the Kremlin’s narrative.
For example, the indictment says Afanasyeva told the company to blame Ukraine for the March 2024 terrorist attack on a Moscow concert hall, even though ISIS has claimed responsibility. The founder of the company said that one of the contributors was “happy to cover.”
Afanasyeva is also accused of asking the company to post a video of “a well-known US political commentator visiting a grocery store in Russia” – possibly a reference to the former Fox News host Tucker Carlson, who traveled to Moscow in February. According to the indictment, a producer at the company told one of the founders “it just felt like a clear shilling,” but was told “to put it in there.”
Afanasyeva also encouraged influencers to share company videos on their own channels, and became angry when she didn’t think they were promoting enough, according to the indictment.
Some Tenet Media contributors dispute the idea that there are outside forces shaping their work.
“Never has anyone but me had complete editorial control over the show and the show’s content is often apolitical,” Pool wrote. “The show is produced entirely by our local team with no input from anyone outside the company.”
“There has been no impact on me in that way. There has been no change in perspective or the nature of my content,” said Matt Christiansen, another Tenet Media contributor, in a livestream Wednesday afternoon. “How can I not accidentally be tricked into saying other people’s words when I write everyone?”
